Neighbors turn out to oppose proposed cell phone tower site

WESTPORT — Several dozen residents living on or around the south end of Drift Road gathered at Town Hall last Wednesday night to express their opposition to a proposed cellular phone tower location on Olin Howland Way.

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By ROBERT BARBOZA

southcoasttoday.com

By ROBERT BARBOZA

Posted Dec. 25, 2013 at 12:01 AM

By ROBERT BARBOZA

Posted Dec. 25, 2013 at 12:01 AM

» Social News

WESTPORT — Several dozen residents living on or around the south end of Drift Road gathered at Town Hall last Wednesday night to express their opposition to a proposed cellular phone tower location on Olin Howland Way.

New Cingular Wireless PCS, LLC, a tower management company owned by AT&T, has applied to the Zoning Board of Appeals for a special permit and several variances from zoning regulations in order to erect a 150-foot steel monopole topped by as many as three cellular antennae arrays.

The request for a special permit comes after the company was denied a building permit for the tower project in a residential/agricultural zone.

At the Dec. 18 public hearing on the application, Westport Building Inspector Ralph Souza confirmed that he denied the building permit application for the property located at 7 Olin Way because town bylaws permit cell phone towers by right only in an approved overlay district in the north end of town.

The federal Wireless Communications Act of 1996, however, requires communities to allow wireless towers in any part of town where service providers can demonstrate a lack of adequate cell phone service, noted Zoning Board of Appeals Chairman Clayton Harrison. The board can reject the specific location being proposed, but not ban towers from the neighborhood, under federal law, he added.

He said the special permit would require variances for exceeding the 90-foot height restrictions on any towers outside the overlay district, and from specific sideline setback requirements in the bylaws for cellular towers and related wireless communications facilities.

Initial plans call for a 15-foot access easement along the driveway located at 7 Olin Way to reach the proposed tower location, which would sit inside a 40 foot by 40 foot fenced compound protecting the tower and related communications equipment, said AT& T network representative attorney Edward Pare.

The attorney said the tower "would also accommodate at least two other (wireless) carriers" if approved, as mandated by zoning bylaws aimed at keeping the number of cell towers in town to a minimum. There are no tall buildings in the area on which wireless antennae arrays could be located in order to provide adequate cellular and data transmission services, he indicated.

The proposed tower would allow AT & T and other cellular companies to provide greatly improved service from the south end of Drift Road all the way to Main Road, Atty. Pare said. At present, much of the area has either limited "outdoor coverage" or "in-car coverage" outside of any buildings, he noted.

The 20-acre Olin Howland Way site is owned by Karal Ranch LLC, a company operated by Alfred Ross of Dartmouth, who uses the property as a racehorse breeding and training facility. Ross told ZBA members that he rents the house on the property to a couple which manages the horse farm for him.

"It's not going to be invisible; it's 150 feet high," Atty. Karam said of the proposed tower. "It's going to be visible" to most residents in the area, he confirmed, no matter where the tower is located in the neighborhood.

He said the company is open to finding an alternate location for the proposed cell phone tower if the residents of the neighborhood are opposed to the site off the private lane. "Our goal is"¦ we want to provide service, and we want these folks to buy the service we provide there," he noted.

Olin Howland Way resident Mark Pawlak told Appeals Board members at the Dec. 18 public hearing that the company should research alternate locations, as he and other neighbors are "opposed to this location on a variety of levels."

The visual aesthetics of the scenic private lane would be ruined by a cell phone tower, which would lower property values in the neighborhood and raise "potential health issues" for those living around the microwave transmission facility, he said.

"It's an unreasonable usage" in a residential zone, he added, suggesting, "many of my neighbors feel the same way that I do"¦ this is something that just doesn't fit in this neighborhood."

While admitting that cell phone service in the area "is not great" and a tower would improve coverage, he urged that the company investigate other locations.

Pawlak and other South Westport residents complained that they were not made aware of the recent "balloon test" conducted by New Cingular Wireless to help gauge the potential visual impact of a cell phone tower on the landscape.

ZBA member Jerry Coutinho urged the company's attorney to repeat the test for his board and neighbors. "You need to do another (balloon) test that all these people know about, so they can see what it will look like"¦ and so we can get a better idea of the visual impact on the neighborhood," he said.

Coutinho also questioned whether Ross' tenants should be allowed to run their cleaning business on the property. "Under town bylaws, owners can run a business on their (residential-zoned) property, but not renters," he noted.

Westport Historical Commission member Jane Loos said her board is also concerned about the potential impact the cell tower might have on the nearby historic district at Westport Point. She cited a Dec. 13 letter from the Mass. Historical Commission noting there are several historic properties in the neighborhood that would be affected, and calling for another balloon test to help gauge the potential visual impacts.

The state Historical Commission must sign off on site assignments for any cellular phone towers that can be seen from registered historical properties, ZBA members noted.

Drift Road resident Robert Rondeau told the Appeals Board he was also concerned about the potential health issues raised by living near a microwave transmission facility. "I don't want that tower there at all," he said in response to suggestions that another site on the 20-acre farm might be considered.

Olin Howland Way resident Peter Obash felt that the private lane was not a suitable site, no matter where the tower is located. He recognized the need for improved cellular service in the area, but said, "I'm not sure this is the right location" for a 150-foot tower requiring multiple variances from the town.

He said it was also unfair for other property owners on the private gravel lane to have to deal with increased traffic from construction and maintenance workers. The four landowners share road maintenance costs, he noted, but "90 percent of the traffic on the road is related to the horse farm property."

After listening to the list of concerns from neighbors, Atty. Karam told the Appeals Board "we're getting the message" and will search for alternative locations that might meet setback requirements before revising the plans and presenting them at a future session of the public hearing, continued to Feb. 26.

He said the company had approached at least three other property owners in the area, asking them to consider renting a cell tower location. All three rejected the company's advances; saying, "they had no interest," he advised the board.